According to CNN, US Capitol Police Officer Briana Kirkland filed a lawsuit against former President Donald Trump over the physical and emotional pain that she endured during the deadly January 6 insurrection.
Kirkland’s injuries during the Capitol attack include a traumatic brain injury. The injured officer’s suit argues that Trump played a “central role in inciting” the riot, according to Business Insider. Kirkland, 29, claims in the lawsuit that the former President’s “provocative words and actions” resulted in the violence she and other officers experienced.
“As the leader of this violent mob, who took their cues from his campaign rhetoric and personal tweets and traveled from around the country to the nation’s capital at Trump’s invitation for the January 6 rally, Trump was in a position of extraordinary influence over his followers, who committed assault and battery on Briana Kirkland,” the complaint states. “Trump, by his words and conduct, directed the mob that stormed the Capitol and assaulted and battered Briana Kirkland.”
Due to the traumatic brain injury she suffered, Kirkland was forced to take a year off from work. Due to that, she’s seeking at least $75,000 in damages, according to the complaint.
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“Officer Kirkland endured an odyssey in which she started as one of the twenty or so USCP officers sent to the West Front of the United States Capitol, and ended covered in chemical spray, blood, with a traumatic brain injury that would cost her a year of her personal and professional life, and physical and personal injuries that will be with her indefinitely,” her attorney, Patrick Malone, wrote in the filing on Thursday — the first anniversary of the attack, according to CNN.
Kirkland said that she had little protective gear and was outnumbered by the pro-Trump crowd by 450 people to 1.
“All she could do was try to stand her ground as she gripped her baton in her hand with all her strength,” the complaint states.
The twice-impeached one-term President had been hit with two other federal lawsuits Tuesday from law enforcement officers.
Indeed, Trump used some form of the word “fight” at least 22 times during his speech at the rally that proceeded the riot. Words mean things, and even more so coming from the President of the most powerful country on earth.
Featured image via Political Tribune gallery
